And Then The Tears Fell
by Taste's Like Home
Summary: Losing her sanity, Clarice is referred to a head doctor... but what if he was more familiar than she thought... Based on Surprise Surprise, rewritten. Rated T for mild swearing and some violence.
1. Saddness

And Then The Tears Fell

**Goddamn I have been out of writing for so long! It feels good to be back!**

**Ok, so this story is based on one of my earlier stories, Surprise Surprise. The difference is that Surprise Surprise was the first ever fanfiction that I wrote, and that I was 13 or14 when I wrote it. I am now older and wiser, and was going to re write Surprise Surprise. But instead, I thought i'd write a new one, then I could compare!!**

**Enjoy! And please take time out to check out the short Surprise Surprise, its a great, very poorly written little story!**

Chapter One.

Clarice kicked the door hard, a heavy card box filling her hands and keys dangling loosely from her mouth as she pushed the door wide open with her foot, darting inside quickly before the oak came racing back towards her. She put the box down in the hall and turned back to the door, taking the slightly wet keys from her mouth and shoving them in the lock, twisting them sharply before removing them and throwing them on the small table underneath the mirror.

As she turned to begin down the hall, she stumbled over the box that she had only moments earlier place by her feet. She cursed out loud as her toe stubbed the corner of the box, pausing momentarily before she shouted angrily and kicked the box for being in her way, which only ended in more pain. Defeated, she stormed over the box and down the hall, flicking the switch as she entered the small but neat kitchen of her apartment.

She stopped before passing through the open doorway, waiting for the lights to flicker on. Scanning the kitchen briefly, she walked straight in and to the fridge, grabbing the chrome handle and yanking the door open, only to be greeted by a bright yellow light, a few out-of-date eggs, mayonnaise and something in a tub which, when opened, was very obviously off.

Closing the door, she looked around her somewhat barren kitchen. Had she really been gone that long? It had only felt like a few hours, as if time had barely passed. There was no food about, and anything that did happen to be in sight was out-of-date. The plates had been washed and put away, so even her trademark bit of clutter near the kitchen sink was missing. Obviously her good friend Ardelia had kept her promise and had come around a few times to check up on the place.

Turning back to the fridge, she contemplated eating the something-in-the-tub as her stomach growled at her. It couldn't be that bad, she reassured herself, she had only been away for a week after all, and nothing could taste quite as bad as prison food. She half smiled to herself. Prison food. She never would have thought that she would ever be able to say that she had tried prison food. And more to the point, eaten prison food willingly.

Closing the fridge door again, she felt herself slip back into her thoughts. It was all she could do of late, replay things in her mind, watch and wonder where things had gotten so bad, at which point should she have let it lie or gone along with it…

The Good Doctor had cut through the chains of the handcuffs that held the two people together, the actual cuffs still attached to his wrist. He had looked up at Clarice, whose eyes were still screwed shut. After a few moments they began to relax as they opened slightly to see the damage that he had caused, only to see that there was no damage, save the bond between them was broken. Her eyes flickered towards the man stood before her as she felt helpless, her hair still stuck in the fridge, trapping her. He looked over her, smiling slightly, those maroon eyes burning right through her.

"Did you truly think that I would ever hurt you, Clarice?" She decided not to answer. He smiled slightly more before sighing. "Not in a thousand years." He said simply. She looked back at him, conflicting emotions flying through her mind, not knowing what to say or do, or what to want to say or do. She could feel herself break right there in front of him, and she knew that he could see it. She was unravelling before his very eyes. "Clarice, there is nothing more that I would love in the world than to stay here with you, but I am really pressed for time. If I thought for even a moment that you would abandon your moral duties to those who have betrayed you then I would invite you to come with me… But you wouldn't be the Special Agent Starling that I know if you did… So once again, I must be leaving."

And with that, he turned and began to walk out of the kitchen. Without thinking about it, with no hesitation, suddenly she spoke, without really wanting to.

"This moment will stay with me forever. You will haunt my dreams." As he reached the doorway, he turned to look at her, watching her as she struggled to control her breathing.

"I already haunt your dreams, Clarice."

And with that, he was gone.

The next few hours were a blur. There had been sirens, police, search dogs. Then she was travelling for what seemed like such a long time… then bright lights and men in white coats pulling her eyes open and shining lights in them, scribbles on bits of paper, someone speaking to her, people asking her questions that she couldn't answer… and then all of a sudden… nothing.

Clarice awoke the next day, wondering where the hell she was and why her head hurt so badly. Her breathing seemed slow and laboured, and she couldn't fathom out where the hell she was. A door opened and footstep followed, Clarice looked up to see where the noise was coming from.

"Please Miss Starling, don't get up."

"I wasn't going to…" She said groggily. "Where am I?"

"You're in the State Hospital. My name is Doctor Edward Noble."

"What… how, how long have I been here?"

"You were admitted last night. The time is now 18:22."

"How long have I been asleep for?" There was a pause from the Doctor.

"Miss Starling, you didn't fall asleep. When you were admitted the nurse gave you a shot of morphine for the bullet wound to your shoulder. We were unaware that you had already received some level of… treatment…" He sighed. "We weren't aware that you had already been administered morphine. Your body couldn't handle the amount of morphine…."

"I had an overdose on morphine?"

"Basically… yes. Do you remember anything at all before you passed out?"

"I remember bright lights, men in white coats… everything felt hot and I couldn't breathe…"

"Yes, typical signs of an overdose. Symptoms can be confusion, breathing difficulties, weakness…"

"So what's happening now?" Clarice butted in.

"Well, we looked over the bullet wound in your shoulder, but it had already been treated. The bullet had been removed and it was a very tidy stitching. We treated you for the overdose and tidied the wound up."

"So when can I go home?"

"Ha, so anxious to leave! Well, I don't know much about what happened last night Miss Starling, but the police and FBI want to question you."

Memories of the previous night's events came flooding back. Oh no. This was not going to be pretty.

True to her word, it wasn't pretty. The police and FBI alike thought that Doctor Lecter and Clarice had conspired to kill Paul Krendler. Everyone in the department knew of the conflict of interests between Paul and Clarice, and people guessed that after he had her suspended that it was the last straw. She was arrested, and spent 5 nights in a prison cell. Alone with nothing but her thoughts, no help or release from the flashbacks, everytime someone walked down that yard she expected it to be him with a clipboard and a pair of glasses, coming to break her mind fully. Towards the end of her stint in prison she didn't eat, and hallucinations soon came. She would wake up screaming after seeing him in her dreams, only to find that in her waking moments he was there still, analysing her and evaluating her, that small smile always on his features. Eventually she was moved to solitary confinement after waking up the other inmates too often, where she was truly alone, with nothing but the plain white walls for her thoughts to bounce off. She would see those maroon eyes boring into her flesh through the viewing space in the door, sucking her soul from her body. Slowly, she was losing her mind, and she knew. And there was nothing that she could do about it.

5 nights after being arrested, she was released after "sufficient evidence had been found proving her innocence". She walked away from the county state prison 3lbs lighter in weight, and with the feeling that her sanity and reasoning had been lost completely.

It was on this day that she had arrived at home, with a box of all the things that she had left at the federal office from the first time she had been suspended. Tired and weary, angry and paranoid she stood in her kitchen, lost in her thoughts completely…

Until….

A noise.

In the hallway…

A sudden click broke Clarice out of her trance, her eyes darting up towards the open doorway.

Footsteps…

On the wooden floor….

_Someone was in her house….._

She stood there, bound to the spot with fear, her ration mind lost within herself. The footsteps drew closer, Clarice couldn't move… it was Hannibal, it had to be Hannibal, he was coming back for her, he wanted her soul after all….

Her eyes widen as the 4th set of footsteps came, so close to the door now….

And the 5th… and the 6th…. And the 7th…

It didn't take 7 set of steps to get to the kitchen….

Yet she could still hear footsteps…

Somehow forcing herself to move, she tip toed to the doorway, and peeked around the corner….

There was no-one there. Just the mail on the floor, a paper still stuck through the letter box where the kid hadn't shoved it through properly.

There was no-one in her house. She was imagining it.

She had truly lost her mind.

And then… the tears fell.

**Feel free to read and review, flames are not really welcome because they are utterly usless and really piss me off. Just tell me what you think xx**


	2. Business Card

And Then The Tears Fell.

**Ok, sorry I haven't updated sooner people, I am a very very busy girl:-)**

**Finally watched Hannibal Rising, I thought it was very good, and the guy that plays young Hannibal is fantastic and a little bit good looking!!! Just reading the book, so gonna see how it compares!!**

**Enjoy!!!**

Chapter 2

The hours just seemed to melt into one long expanse of time for Clarice. She would barely notice the light turning into dark, the moonlight touching the walls of her empty kitchen replacing the warming rays of the sun. She would sit with her knees tucked to her chest as she balanced her now small frame on the table chair of her kitchen, her thin fingers wrapped around the diminishing warmth of her mug of tea. Every now and again she would take a sip, even the taste of the milk in her tea was starting to repulse her. It had been 4 days since she arrived home and she had not left the house at all. The amount of food in her house had stayed the same, save the last few slices of brown bread that Clarice had found a few days earlier. She hadn't eaten for days.

Often she would sit in front of the mirror in her bedroom or stand in the hall, looking at her hollow self. Her mind was so full of thoughts that she couldn't concentrate on one, just a swirl of emotions floating in her head. She would look at the empty shell of her body and feel nothing. No self pity, no self worth. After days of not eating she had lost a considerable amount of weight from her already athletic body, at least another 4 pounds. Her wrists were small and looked snap able, her neck was stringy and her face was beginning to look gaunt. If she were to have the inclination or the energy to touch her stomach she would feel the beginnings of ribs poking through the now almost fatless stomach. Her hip bones were also beginning to protrude, her jeans slipping down now that they were too big for her.

She could see that she looked terrible. She didn't care though. There was no-one to see her anyway. No-one wanted to see her.

Every now and again she would catch herself looking over her small frame and almost feeling proud. She didn't get hungry anymore. She didn't need food.

"This is not you Clarice. You are not like this. You are strong, and brilliant, and you are…"

"Why are you referring to yourself in the third person?" She would ask herself as the voice that had begun to speak to her faded away slowly. She didn't have the energy for a conversation. Besides there was no-one to have a conversation with, only herself. And she had to admit; even the voice that every now and again would try to lull her into normality was getting annoying. The voice faded and once again there was nothing in her mind but the whirlwind of thoughts that she couldn't control or calm enough to seriously look at. So there was silence. There was nothing. No self worth, no pride…..

Everything about her was slowly vanishing.

Maybe she was vanishing.

No-one had called on her since she had got back. No-one had tried to see if she was ok, she was suppose to go back to the hospital for a check-up and to have stitches out but she hadn't gone, yet no-one had tried to contact her. The phone had rang twice and she hadn't answered it either times. They probably thought that she was dead.

As thoughts floated in her mind she would get so tired of trying to pick just one to focus on that she would float away into nothingness too, her mind still and silent in a way that she only got when she was resting. And a sudden noise or a bang or clatter would snap her back and her eyes would fly open as her mind settled again on trying to focus on just one thing. She didn't really sleep anymore, these times were her sleeping, her times for rest. She would lie on her bed, but she wouldn't sleep. Well she didn't feel like she had ever slept.

On the morning of her fourth day of not leaving the house and having no contact with anyone, she was awoken from her resting by the telephone ringing, the shrill sound cutting through the air. She ignored it and rolled over, feeling her hip bone on the mattress below her. She glanced at the clock on the wall…

09:15.

She would just have two more minutes…. Then she would get up and make herself a drink….. But she would just have… two… more…. Minutes…..

The rapid rapping of a knuckle on her front door forced her eyes to fly open, the daylight shining through the blinds on her window confirming that those maroon eyes were not there in front of her, staring into her….

The sound of the knock bounced through the room, it seemed too loud. She didn't want to get up; she didn't want to see who it was. She didn't have the energy to be scared in case it was Him…. She'd rather not know….

Two minutes later the phone rang again, and knuckles rapped the door.

Someone really wanted to see her.

Clarice swung her legs out of her bed, her bare feet slapping the floor as she got up and walked away leaving the bed without making it. She glanced up at the clock on her pale wall.

11:25.

Her feet slapped the whole way down the floorboards right up until she got to the point where she could see the door. She stopped just as the phone stopped ringing. She glanced at the phone accusingly and jumped back as the door sounded again…. Attentively she put her left foot in front of the right; it was only a few more steps towards the door….. She could see the silhouette of someone stood on the other side of the door…. It looked like a man…..

Clarice dipped her hand into the draw on her dresser, her fingers grasping the handle of a small knife, her trembling fingers flicking the key around in the key hole, hearing the lock click she took a firmish grip of the door handle….. pulling it down she opened the door towards her….

"Starling! Where the hell have you been, I've been trying to ring you for the past two hours, why haven't you answered you're goddamn phone? I've had to leave the office to come and check you're ok like some kind of baby sitter…." Jack Crawford stopped his torrent of words as he saw Clarice's face peek out from behind the half open door, her eyes squinting in the mid morning sun. Her hair was lank and greasy and stuck to her head, dark circles had formed around her eyes and she had lost a hell of a lot of weight. "Starling…?"

Clarice just looked around the street, searching for nothing. "Can I come in?" Crawford asked, realising that something was very, very wrong. Clarice didn't say anything, she just opened the door and let him through, placing the knife back down on the dresser as she turned and walked into the kitchen.

Crawford closed the door behind her, noticing the knife on the side that Clarice had just put down. His eyes gazed around the house, it had a funny stale smell to it, not in a dirty way, but as if there was no fresh air. She followed her friend into the kitchen to see Clarice stood in front of the kettle.

"Do you want a drink Jack?" Clarice asked. Her voice sounded hoarse from lack of use.

"Starling, what the hell's happened here?"

"Nothing's happened here." Crawford looked around her again. The kitchen was empty. There was no food, no mess, no anything! His eyes trailed over to the woman stood before him and he was shocked at what he saw. The powerful, fiery woman whom he had once known was now stood before him at least 7lbs lighter, making her look far too thin for her already slim figure, her skin was pale and sallow, her eyes dull, hair lank…. This was not the woman he knew….

"Clarice…." He didn't know what to say. Clarice just looked at her former boss. There was nothing. Nothing in those eyes of hers. She really was losing it.

"So, how've you been?" She just looked back at him. He took a deep breath. "How's your shoulder?" His eyes flickered to her shoulder where the wound would be.

'Oh, it's healing.' She said, as if she hadn't noticed his eyes looking at her shoulder.

'It'll leave a scar?' Crawford already knew the answer.

'Probably.'

'Physically or mentally?' Clarice didn't answer. There was an uneasy silence. "Perhaps it already has…"

"Excuse me?" Crawford just looked away and started to pace the room slowly. He opened on of the cupboards to find it empty, then looked around the bare room, then back at her. "Why are you here Jack?"

"Clarice, we're worried about you."

"Who's 'we'?"

"The department. And me. We haven't heard from you since all this, hell you look like death….. And I read the hospital reports. And the prisons."

"Those are private Jack they are nothing to do with you."

"When was the last time you ate Clarice? When was the last time you had a shower? Left the house?"

"That is none of your business!" Clarice could feel herself getting angry, even though her body was telling her that she didn't have the energy….

"Come on Starling! Look at you! This isn't right, this isn't you! What's going on huh?" Clarice just turned away from him. "I think you need a break Clarice. I think that you've been through a lot recently, you need to sort yourself out."

"Oh! That's very kind of you Doctor Crawford, is that your analytical evaluation of my state of mind because you are bang on the mark!"

"Look at you! Listen to yourself! This isn't like you! You're not like this…."

"So you're the voice that keeps telling me that…" Clarice mumbled to herself. Jack took a small step back as he lifted his head slightly.

"Clarice, you need to see someone. You need help. Its perfectly natural, you've been through a lot…."

"I don't want to see anyone Jack! I don't want to see you, or anyone from work, or anyone else! I don't need to see anyone!" She shouted, leaning in towards him slightly. Jack looked away and took a deep breath. He slipped his hand in his pocket and took out a small business card.

"This is the number of one of Europe's most highly thought of psychiatrists. He has agreed to see you, all we need to do is arrange a time…."

"You've done all this? Behind my back…..?"

"Well Clarice you weren't exactly there to ask, and seen as you don't answer your phone anymore…."

"Wait a minute, who gave you permission to come in here and try to sort my life out? You talk to me like you know what I am thinking? Well you can bog off because you don't know what I am thinking, and you can stop right there trying to help me, because it's YOU and THE DEPARTMENT that's made me like this!"

"It was not us and you know it, you know exactly who to blame for this…"

"Don't you dare, don't you dare say it…."

"I wouldn't give him the credit of taking your sanity away from you Clarice, I mean yourself. You have done this to yourself. What did I tell you? Don't let Hannibal Lecter get inside your head. First day, first time. And what do you do? You let your weaknesses walk all over you… You let him in there. Now look what he has done to you."

Then Clarice did something that unnerved Jack Crawford more than anything had done that day. She didn't react.

"Please leave." She turned away from him, leaning on the counter top to steady herself. "Please, just leave me alone." Jack didn't know what to say.

"Clarice…. Please…."

"Just go." She said simply. He sighed, slowly backing out of the room.

"The card is on the table Clarice. You need to get yourself sorted out. Just…. Just give me a call soon." She said nothing.

And with that, he walked out of the house, closing the door firmly behind him.

* * *

Clarice was more confused than ever. Where there should have been and usually would have been anger, there was nothing. Nobody would have ever walked into Clarice Starling's house and given her abuse like that and got away with it! She would have been furious, and the least she would have done is pulled her gun on him! Yet there wasn't any anger, where she would have usually have been beside herself… she didn't even feel upset. Nothing. No feelings.

She knew that she needed help. This was getting out of control. Maybe she should take the hand of friendship that the department was offering….. the same hand that had played a massive part in making her like this in the first place…..

Clarice sighed, walking over to the table and sliding the business card off it, twirling it in her fingers so she could read it.

"Dr Shaun Walker PhD- Clinical psychology. 35, Greenhead Lane, London."

London???

Clarice sighed again. London? Did she even have the energy to travel? To talk to someone who wanted to get inside her head?

All she knew was that she could sort this.. whatever it was, out herself. She would give herself 2 more days to do something about it, and failing that she would need to look for help.

Until then, all she wanted to do is go back to bed, just for 2 minutes….

**Ok, I know, not much advancement, but please just work with me here!! Thank you to the people who have alrady reviewed, superstars!!! Mwuah Mwuah:-)**


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